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Pagan, William. Road reform: A plan for abolishing turnpike tolls, pontages, and statute labour assessments and for providing other funds for the public roads and bridges.... Third edition. Edinburgh & London: William Blackwood & Sons, 1857. 8vo (19.9 cm, 7.875"). [2] ff., 165, [1 (blank)], 6 pp., [1 (blank)] f.
$145.00
Detailed plan, including tables, for improving the quality and financing of the Scottish transportation system: First published in 1845, this is the third of three editions.
Rare: We trace no U.S. copies of this edition via NUC Pre-1956, OCLC, or RLIN.
NSTC 2P809, Imprint 3; this edition not in Goldsmith’s-Kress. Recent speckled brown wrappers. Some shallow chipping. Closely trimmed by binder, shaving a few signatures and borders of tables. Inked numeral in margin of title-page.
“The Vast Antiquity of Our Species”
Page, David. Man: Where, whence, and whither? New York: Moorhead, Bond & Co., 1868. 12mo. 197, [3 (2 adv.)] pp.
$35.00
“Being a glance at Man in his natural-history relations.” First U.S. edition, following the Edinburgh first of the preceding year. The title-page is printed in black and red.
Publisher's cloth, spine with gilt-stamped title; small discolored spot on spine from now-absent label. Front pastedown with institutional rubber-stamp (no other markings). (19153)
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Pageau, abbé. Memoires des intrigues de la cour de Rome, depuis l’année 1669 jusques en 1676. Paris: Estienne Michallet, 1677. 12mo (14.5 cm, 5.7"). [8], 265, [1] pp.
$450.00
Second edition, following the first of the previous year, also published by Michallet. The author (who published this work anonymously) distinguishes between the corruption of the politically oriented court at Rome and the sanctity of the Holy See, while challenging the self-aggrandizing Cardinal Paluzzi-Altieri’s power and abuses thereof.
Both this and the first edition are scarce. Searches of OCLC, RLIN, and NUC Pre-1956 find only seven U.S. institutional holdings of the 1677 printing.
Barbier, Dictionnaire des ouvrages anonymes, IV, 213; BM STC French, 1601–1700, R1083. Contemporary speckled calf, spine gilt extra; leather slightly acid-pitted, with edges and joints rubbed and unobtrusive number inked on back cover, spine with gilt a bit rubbed and paper shelving label in uppermost compartment. Front pastedown with inked ownership inscription dated 1737.
Paleario, Aonio. ... Opera. Ad illam editionem quam ipse auctor recensuerat & auxerat excusa, nunc novis accessionibus locupletata ... Amstelaedami: Apud Henricum Wetstenium, 1696. 8vo (16.5 cm; 6.5"). *8 **4 A-Z8 Aa–Ss8 Tt4 (Tt4 blank); [12] ff., 650, [7] ff.
$450.00
Expressing beliefs contrary to accepted Catholic Church policy or dogma could mean trouble with the Inquisition in the heady times of the Reformation. One could avoid run-ins with the Holy Office by keeping quiet, by not publishing, or by having influential protectors. Aonio Paleario (1503–70) chose to express and even publish beliefs that were sufficiently non-mainstream Catholic that he came to the attention of the Inquisition in Italy three times. The first two instances saw the charges dropped thanks to the intervention of powerful protectors, the third proved fatal, his protectors having died.
Paleario was at once a creation of the Renaissance and of the Reformation: He carried on a wide correspondence with the intellectuals of his time, he studied the writings of Luther and Erasmus, and he sought to reconcile the old with the new. This edition of his works is chiefly composed of his letters, but also includes “De Immortalitate Animorum libri III,” and “Poematia.”
On Paleario, see: Contemporaries of Erasmus, III, 45–46. Contemporary vellum over boards; bit of abrasion and black speckling in lower area of spine. 18th-century armorial bookplate on front pastedown. Occasional light spotting in text. Notes in pencil on rear endpapers. Rear free endpaper torn with loss of paper in the lower outer area.
Paleotti,
Alfonso, Daniel Mallonius, & Marco Vigerio. Historia admiranda. Duaci:
Ex typographia Baltazaris Belleri, 1607. 4to (22 cm, 8.5"). 2 vols. in 1. I: π2
(π1+†8) ††8 (-††7–8=π2?)
A–Z8 Aa–Gg8; [16] ff., 429, [1] pp., [25] ff.;
illus. II: *4 †4 ††2 A–Z8
Aa–Ee8 Ff–Kk4; [10] ff., 444 pp.; illus.
$2200.00

Though issued under a common title as the Historia admiranda,
the De Iesu Christi stigmatibus sacrae sindoni impressis and the
Decachordum Christianum are actually two separate works. The earlier,
Decachordum Christianum, which constitutes vol. II of the Historia
admiranda, is by Marco Cardinal Vigerio (1446–1516). It was first
published in 1507, and discusses the mysteries of Christ’s life from
the Annunciation through Pentecost with many side trips. A supplementary
piece by
the same author on the instruments of
the
Passion follows. This edition of these
two pieces of Vigerio was edited by Richard Gibbons (1550–1632), a noted
English recusant scholar and Jesuit priest who spent most of his career at
Douai
teaching as well as translating, editing, and annotating various learned works.
Preceding
the Decachordum Christianum is the De Jesu Christi stigmatibus,
a discussion of the wounds of Christ as found on the shroud of Turin, composed
by Alfonso Paleotti (1531–1610) archbishop of Bologna. His discussion
of the shroud is interspersed with a more forensic analysis of the sufferings
endured by Jesus, by Daniel Mallonius, an Italian Hieronymite priest. This
was first published separately in 1606.
This 1607 edition of the Historia admiranda is apparently
the
first joint publication of these works under this
title, and it was followed by a 1616 edition. In this edition the De
Jesu Christi stigmatibus opens with an engraved title-page and
has
16
full-page engravings illustrating the shroud of
Turin from both front and back, as well as the wounds of Christ
and the instruments of
the Passion. The Decahordum christianum has
10
full-page engravings showing scenes from the life of Christ,
that of the Annunciation being strikingly beautiful. Though continuous
in
pagination, the supplementary De excellentia instrumentorum Dominicae
Passionis
by Vigerio has its own sectional title-page incorporating a striking engraved
vignette of Christ as the man of sorrows. Both volumes are printed with
woodcut
initials, head- and tailpieces, and sidenotes.


Allison
& Rogers report European holdings of this, but we traced
none
in the U.S.

Allison & Rogers, Catholic Books 590, see also
the note on p. 105; Shaaber G275. Vellum over paste boards, with slightly
yapp edges and holes for ties apparent; somewhat spotted and soiled, covers
lightly sprung. Spine with inked title and remnants of paper label; tears
at head. Front hinge (inside) repaired. Remnants of library booklabel on front
pastedown and small stamp of a private club on rear free endpaper; endpapers
and title-page of vol. I with light soiling and an excision from the top margin.
Inked ownership inscription on recto of front free endpaper. Pages with occasional
light soiling. All edges green, though rubbed.
Pallavicino, Sforza. Vera concilii tridentini historia. contra falsam Petri Suavis Polani narrationem, scripta & asserta à P. Sfortia Pallavicino ... Primum italico idiomate in lucem edita; deinde ab ipso auctore aucta & revisa; ac latinè reddita à P. Johanne Baptista Giattino. Antuerpiae: no printer/publisher, 1673. Folio. 3 parts in 1 vol. I: [a]–b6 A–Z6 Aa–Bb6 Cc–Dd4; [5] ff., 14, 296 pp., [11] ff. II: π2 A–Z6 Aa–Dd6; [2] ff., 297, [1] pp., [15] ff. III: π2 A–Z6 Aa–Ff6; [2] ff., 326 pp., [11] ff.
$450.00
Click the interior images for enlargements.
Early edition in Latin of Father Pallavicino’s refutation of Paolo Sarpi’s pseudonymously published Historia del Concilio tridentino. Pallavicino, a Jesuit and later in life a cardinal, first published his counterblast in Italian (Rome, 1656–57) and there, as here in Gianttino’s translation, the historic Council of Trent (1545–63) is vindicated and Sarpi is brutalized.
The volume begins with a half-title, followed by an added engraved title-page that is printed from one very large plate (signed by Kilian). The main and each of the divisional title-pages has a large printer’s device of a lion with bees and the motto “De forti dulcedo” (Joannis Posuel, the Lyonnaise printer?). There are woodcut head- and tailpieces. The text is printed in double-column format.
DeBacker-Sommervogel, III, 1398; also VI, 130. Contemporary vellum over paste boards, round spine, raised bands; covers ruled in blind with a double-fillet to form concentric compartments; center of each cover with a large blind-stamped medallion of interwoven design. Front joint open along the bottom two spine compartments; some soiling and stains. Title-page of pars I torn and crumpled along inner area of upper margin, tear repaired from verso; area of tear with slight crumpling. Foxing. scattered throughout, sometimes very noticeable; some ink blots; also browning from interaction of printer’s ink with impurities in paper at time of manufacture.
Parabosco, Girolamo. L’hermafrodito. Comedia... di nuovo ricorretta e ristampata. Vinegia: Gabriel Giolito de’Ferrari, 1560. (13.5 cm, 5.25"). 48 ff. [bound with the same author’s] Il Marinaio. Vinegia: Gabriel Giolito de’Ferrari, 1560. 59 ff. (lacking ff. 2 & 3, and final blank). [with] Il viluppo. Comedia nova....Vinegia: Gabriel Giolito de’Ferrari, 1568. 59, [1] ff. [with] Il pellegrino. Vinegia: Gabriel Giolito de’Ferrari, 1560. 36 ff.
$600.00
Click the left or middle image for an enlargement.
Collection of early editions of four comedies by composer and playwright Parabosco. Two other plays are cited by Brunet as part of the overall work, but are not present here; Adams and some other sources describe the six pieces as separately issued. The plays included in this volume are L’Hermafrodito, Il Marinaio, Il Viluppo (with a publication line dated 1568), and Il Pellegrino.
Adams P238, P239, P246 (1560 ed. only), P243; Brunet, IV, 356. Contemporary vellum-covered boards, spine with inked title; vellum slightly soiled, with spine title faded. All edges stained blue. First title-page mounted and several leaves with outer margins or upper outer corners reinforced, two pages with loss of a few letters at upper outer corners. Second play lacking two preliminary leaves and final register leaf. Two leaves with annotations in an early inked hand, now faded; pages with intermittent mild waterstaining.
Parkman, Francis. The discovery of the great West. Boston: Little, Brown, & Co., 1869. 8vo (21.3 cm, 8.4"). xxi, [3], 425, [1] pp.; 1 map.
$100.00
First edition: The third portion of Parkman’s “France and England in North America” historical narrative series, also published under the title LaSalle and the Discovery of the Great West. Focusing on the exploration and settlement of the Mississippi, the work provides much information on LaSalle’s exploits, as well as on the Native Americans of the region.
Publisher’s cloth, spine with gilt-stamped title; spine with small area of light discoloration, binding otherwise clean and intact with only very minor signs of wear to corners and spine extremities. Front pastedown with 19th-century collector’s bookplate and with institutional stamp (no other markings). Page edges slightly brittle, with two short edge tears not extending into text.
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Parry, William Edward. Journal of a voyage for the discovery of a north-west passage from the Atlantic to the Pacific.... London: John Murray, 1821. 4to (27.3 cm, 10.75"). [4] ff., xxix, [3], 310, [2], clxxix, [3 (2 adv.)]pp.; 14 plts., 4 fold. maps, 2 maps.
$1000.00
Click any image above for an enlargement.
First edition of Parry's classic account of his first and most
successful voyage of Arctic exploration (181920), which resulted in the
mapping of extensive stretches of coastline. The volume is illustrated with
14 plates and six maps, four of which are oversized and folding; the appendix
includes tables of navigational and chronometer data, lunar observations, and
a report on the state of health and disease among the men.
The copper-engraved, oversized frontispiece
map shows Baffin's Bay, Barrow's Straits, Prince Regent's Inlet, and the North
Georgian Islands, as well as the bay named after Parry's two ships.
Arctic Bibliography 13145; Hill (2nd ed.) 1311;
Sabin 58860. Recent quarter calf over marbled paper–covered sides, spine
with gilt-stamped leather title and author labels, and gilt-stamped anchor
decorations in compartments. Title-page and a few others, plus reverse of
1 map, lightly stamped by a now-defunct institution. Pages gently age-toned,
with occasional offsetting from engraving and the odd spot or smudge. One
map with small portion of inner margin reinforced; final two leaves with inner
margins reinforced; one plate with tears into image and mounted. Final advertisement
leaf bound in before final text leaf. All edges marbled.
(Pascal, Blaise). Carta de un leonés a uno de los suscritores a la reimpresion de las Cartas provinciales de Pascal. México: Impr. de Luis Abadiano y Valdes, 1842. Small 4to. 16 pp.
$150.00


Will Pascal ever be admitted to the libraries of devout Roman Catholics? The author of this extended essay, who styles himself "Un Leonés" and who signs himself with the initials "J.I.A.," cautions a supposed subscriber to a new edition of Pascal's letters that they are riddled with Jansenist heresy and that the pope still prohibits the devout from reading them.
Sutro 756 ("19p." being a typographical error for collation given here); not in Steele, Independent Mexico: A Collection of Mexican Pamphlets in the Bodleian Library. Folded and never sewn or bound; as issued.
Pascal,
Blaise. Les provinciales ou lettres escrittes par Louis de Montalte .... Cologne: Balthasar Winfelt, 1684. 8vo (21.3 cm, 8.4"). [40], 613, [1 (blank)] pp.
$850.00
Click the interior images for enlargements.
Polyglot edition of Pascal's pseudonymously published Provinciales. This elegantly composed, widely read defense of Antoine Arnauld and of Jansenism against Jesuit opponents appears here in the original French (first printed in 1657), as well as translated into Latin by Guillaume Wendrock (a.k.a., Pierre Nicole), Spanish by Gracian Cordero, and Italian by Cosimo Brunetti. The text is printed in four-column, double-page spreads, displaying all four languages simultaneously.
BM, STC French, 1601-1700, M1313; Brunet, IV, 396; Graesse, V, 145; Printing & the Mind of Man 140. Contemporary speckled calf, scuffed, leather cracking on joints and chipped at head of gilt-stamped spine; spine gilt heavily rubbed, and spine with later hand-inked paper shelving labels. Hinges tender with back free endpaper and fly-leaves starting to separate; front free endpaper and title-page separated and partially taped into place some time ago. Front pastedown with 19th-century private collector's bookplate and early inked doodle; front free endpaper with early inked annotations regarding the Jesuit response. Light intermittent spotting; a few corners crumpled.
The
PETITIONER
“Respectfully Sheweth
. . . ”
Patterson, Alexander. A petition...to
the legislature of Pennsylvania, during the session of 18034, for compensation
for the monies he expended and the services he rendered in defence of the Pennsylvania
title, against the Connecticut claimants; in which is comprised, a faithful
historical detail of important and interesting facts and events that took place
at Wyoming, and in the county of Luzerne, &c. In consequence of the dispute
which existed between the Pennsylvania land-holders, and the Connecticut intruders,
commencing with the year, 1763. Lancaster: Robert Bailey, 1804. 8vo (23.9 cm,
9.4"). 34 pp.
$375.00


Capt. Patterson's complaint: He nearly lost an arm in combat and had his head split by an axe as well, was victimized by the marauding "Intruders" from Connecticut (who wound up permanently settling what is now the Wilkes-Barre region of Pennsylvania, under the Susquehanna Claim), paid for the expenses of numerous other petitioners, and then had the government decline to protect what he considered to be his rights. An absorbingand highly aggrievedchronology of the Yankee-Pennamite wars and their accompanying legal travails, from a personal angle.
Sabin 59130; Shaw & Shoemaker 6994. Recent simple paper-covered boards, spine with printed paper label. Slight cockling; minor foxing to first and last few leaves. Edges untrimmed. Two leaves with inner margin reinforced. A good copy.
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Pearce, Zachary. The miracles of Jesus vindicated...the second edition. London: J. Roberts, 1729. 8vo (19.7 cm, 7.75"). 31, [1 (blank)], 31, [1 (blank)], 32, 39, [1 (blank)] pp.
$300.00

All four parts: Parts I, II, and III are a reimpression of the second edition (without prices on title-pages and with the register continuous), while part IV is here in its first edition. Written by the Bishop of Rochester in response to Thomas Woolston’s Discourses, these essays argue for literal rather than allegorical New Testament interpretation and defend the Scriptural miracles. ESTC N34872; Part IV: ESTC T93310. Recent marbled paper–covered boards, spine with printed paper label. Title-page with traces of now-absent early ownership inscription and with an early inked annotation identifying Pearce, then the Bishop of Bangor, as the author; one page with inked and pencilled annotations. Pages mildly age-toned.
Pegge, Samuel. Memoirs of the life of Roger de Weseham, Dean of Lincoln, Bishop of Coventry and Lichfield.... London: J. Whiston and B. White, 1761. 4to (29 cm, 11.5"). viii, 60 pp.
$250.00

Roger de Weseham, bishop of Lichfield (d. 1257), was a scholarly cleric noted for his reform of his diocese (following the example of his patron, Robert Grosseteste, bishop of Lincoln) and for his devotion to the cure of souls. This is the sole edition of this biography of Weseham, and was written by Samuel Pegge (1704–96), a priest of the Church of England and antiquary known for his collections of coins and medals and his historical writings.
Single-click
the image for an enlargement.
ESTC T98695. On Roger de Weseham, see: The Dictionary of National Biography,LX, 297–98. On Samuel Pegge, see: The Dictionary of National Biography, XLIV, 233–35. In recent marbled wrappers. Uncut copy with nice wide margins; deckle edges with some soiling and a few chipped or dog-eared corners with no loss of impression. Paper lightly age-toned.
Penn, William. The great and popular objection against the repeal of the penal laws & tests briefly stated and consider’d, and which may serve for answer to several late pamphlets upon that subject. London: Andrew Sowle, 1688. 4to (19.8 cm, 7.75"). 23, [1 (blank)] pp.
$1250.00
Click the interior images for enlargements.
Early printing of the first edition, following an eight-page issue by Sowle in the same year. Having already successfully encouraged James II in making small gestures toward religious tolerance, Penn hoped to persuade him to repeal the anti-Catholic Penal Laws and Test Act.
Despite this strongly worded treatise against persecution (which argues that all men should be able to make a free and open choice of faith and worship), the statutes remained in place for many years to come.
Wing (rev.) P1298A; ESTC R12742. Recent marbled paper–covered boards. Title-page with tiny, unobtrusive numeral inked in upper outer corner, first text page with numeral stamped in lower margin (no other markings). Title-page and first text page with moderate foxing, others clean.
Pennsylvania.
Collection of the penal laws of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. Philadelphia: Pr. by Budd & Bartram, for the use of the Prison, 1801. 8vo (19.5 cm, 7.6").
72 pp.
$1000.00
Click any image where the hand appears on
mouse-over, for an enlargement.
Scarce: Only the second such collection of Pennsylvanian criminal laws and legislation, following Zachariah Poulson’s first of 1794. The unspecified prison for which Budd & Bartram printed this work was almost certainly the Walnut Street Prison, in operation from 1773 through 1838 and one of the earliest American penitentiaries as well as a groundbreaking experiment in humanitarian incarceration. At the time of this volume’s publication, the prison reform movement was flourishing in Philadelphia.
Many institutions report microform holdings, but very few hold actual copies.
Sabin 59986; Shaw & Shoemaker 1114. Contemporary-style quarter tan cloth over blue paper-covered sides, spine with printed paper label. Paper embrittled and somewhat fragile; pages age-toned and foxed.
Breeding
Neat Cattle
[Pennsylvania
Agricultural Society]. Hints for American husbandmen, with
communications to the Pennsylvania Agricultural Society. Philadelphia: Clark
& Raser, 1827. 8vo (22.8 cm, 9"). [178] pp.; 3 plts. (of 4; also lacking
frontis.).
$500.00


Uncommon collection of essays and letters on topics relating to
the maintenance of cattle and sheep, including the growing of various grasses,
grains, and root crops; fat content in milk; and principles of "improved breeding."
Shorthorn breeder John Hare Powel contributed a number of pieces (the DAB
actually attributes this entire volume to him), and the productivity of his
cows served as inspiration for an article by three other members of the society.
Also present are pedigrees of certain animals from the Herd Book, as well as
engraved plates depicting a sheep, a type of plough, and Bennett's machine.
Shoemaker 30185; on Powel, see: Dictionary of American Biography,
XV, 14344. Contemporary paper wrappers, front with printed paper label;
wrappers starting along spine, with some chipping at corners and over portion
of front joint; spine and lower edge of front wrapper stained, with stray
pencil marks to front wrapper. Pages untrimmed; varying degrees of foxing,
with some staining. Lacking frontispiece and one plate.
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Pennsylvania Society for the Promotion of Internal Improvements in the Commonwealth. [drop title] Philadelphia, Jan. 13, 1825. The subscribers, the acting committee of "the Pennsylvania Society for the promotion of Internal Improvements in the Commonwealth," respectfully submit the following address on the subject of a canal to connect the waters of the Susquehannah with those of the Alleghany, to the consideration of their fellow citizens. [Philadelphia: 1825]. 8vo (23.3 cm, 9.2"). 7, [1 (blank)] pp.
$275.00
Report on the proposed construction of the Pennsylvania Canal, intended to connect the Allegheny and Susquehanna Rivers for steamboat navigation, following the successful completion of the Erie Canal. The Pennsylvania Society for the Promotion of Internal Improvements in the Commonwealth was established in Philadelphia, in December 1824, to disseminate information on the latest improvements in the development of transportation systems including roads, railways, canals, bridges, etc.; William Strickland, Mathew Carey, Richard Peters, Jr., Joseph Hemphill, Stephen Duncan, and Gerard Ralston were among its members.
Click the image for an enlargement.
Shoemaker 21855. Later light blue paper–covered boards, spine with printed paper title-label. Slightly age-toned, with small paper flaw to one outer margin, else clean.
Pennsylvania Society for the Promotion of Internal Improvements in the Commonwealth. [drop title] At a meeting of the acting committee of the Pennsylvania Society for the Promotion of Internal Improvement, the following original paper was read by one of the members, and ordered to be published and put into general circulation ... No. I. The rivers of Pennsylvania. [Philadelphia, 1825]. 8vo (23.3 cm, 9.2"). 6, [2 (blank)] pp.
$300.00

First edition: Description of the Allegheny River and its suitability for steamboats. The Pennsylvania Society for the Promotion of Internal Improvements in the Commonwealth was established in Philadelphia, in December 1824, to disseminate information on the latest improvements in the development of transportation systems including roads, railways, canals, bridges, et cetera. William Strickland, Mathew Carey, Richard Peters, Jr., Joseph Hemphill, Stephen Duncan, and Gerard Ralston (the corresponding secretary who introduced the present piece) were among its members.
Click the image for an enlargement.
Shoemaker 21854. Light blue paper–covered boards, spine with printed paper title-label. First leaf with closed tear from outer margin, just touching text. Foxed, with some staining to final blank leaf.
Pennsylvania Society for the Promotion of Internal Improvements in the Commonwealth. [drop title] Philadelphia, Feb. 25, 1825. Railways. [Philadelphia, 1825]. 8vo (23.3 cm, 9.2"). 6, [2 (blank)] pp.; illus.
[SOLD]
First edition: A digest of Robert Stevenson’s essay written
for the Highland Society of Edinburgh — a very early discussion of railroads!
Click
either image for an enlargement.
The Pennsylvania Society for the Promotion of Internal Improvements in the Commonwealth
was established in Philadelphia, in December 1824, to disseminate information
on the latest improvements in the development of transportation systems including
roads, railways, canals, bridges, etc.; as the first line of text here puts
it, “The acting committee of ‘The Pennsylvania Society for the Promotion
of Internal Improvement,’ have been, from the formation of the society,
particularly desirous to lay before the public correct information on the subject
of Railways.” William Strickland, Mathew Carey, Richard Peters, Jr., Joseph
Hemphill, Stephen Duncan, and Gerard Ralston were among the society’s
members.
The
in-text
illustrations depict a profile
of a flat railway with the flange, a section of the rail-wagon, and a bird’s
eye view of the railroad. The spine title gives: “Railways. Feb. 25,
1825,” and the foot of p. [1]: “No. 9.”
Shoemaker 21851. Light blue paper–covered boards, spine
with printed paper title-label. Minor offsetting, pages otherwise clean.
Pennsylvania
Society for the Promotion of Internal Improvements in the Commonwealth. [drop title] The subscribers, the acting committee of “the Pennsylvania Society for the Promotion of Internal Improvements in the Commonwealth,” respectfully submit the following essay on the construction and reparation of roads to the consideration of their fellow citizens. [Philadelphia, 1824]. 8vo (23.3 cm, 9.2"). 8 pp.
$330.00

First edition: Early advocacy of the use of macadam roads, a precursor of the modern “blacktop.” The piece consists of two sections, one on road construction and one on road repair.
Click the image for an enlargement.
The Pennsylvania Society for the Promotion of Internal Improvements in the Commonwealth was established in Philadelphia, in December 1824, to disseminate information on the latest improvements in the development of transportation systems including roads, railways, canals, bridges, etc.; William Strickland, Mathew Carey, Richard Peters, Jr., Joseph Hemphill, Stephen Duncan, and Gerard Ralston were among its members.
This first edition is very uncommon. OCLC and RLIN list only five institutional holdings.
Shoemaker 17582; Goldsmiths’-Kress 24653.16 (for 3rd ed.). Later light blue paper–covered boards, spine with printed paper title-label. Pages age-toned, with some light staining confined to margins.
Pepys, Samuel. Diary and correspondence...the diary deciphered by the Rev. J. Smith, A.M. from the original shorthand MS. in the Pepysian Library. With a life and notes by Richard Lord Braybrooke. First American from the fifth London edition.... Philadelphia: J.B. Lippincott & Co., 1855. 8vo (22.3 cm, 8.75"). I: Frontis., xxxvi, 427, [1 (blank)] pp.; II: Frontis., [1] f., 484 pp.; III: [1] f., 481, [1 (blank)] pp.; IV: [2] ff., 470 pp.
$575.00
Pepys’s perennially fascinating shorthand journal in its first longhand transcription, done by John A. Smith, later the rector of Baldock but an undergraduate student at St. John’s College at the time of the work. This appears to be the first Philadelphia printing of the diaries, here in an abridged form edited for decency, although there were earlier American editions and a limited deluxe edition was printed in Philadelphia in the same year. The four-volume work is illustrated with two portraits, one of the author and one of his wife, engraved by J.W. Steel.
NCBEL, II, 1583 (for the 1854 ed. on which the present ed. was based). Publisher’s textured cloth, worn, covers framed in decorative blind-stamping, spines ruled in blind and simply gilt-stamped with titles and volume numbers; spines faded, slightly discolored, all pulled with cloth lost above page level and one with additional chip out of cloth near head. Front pastedowns with tickets from a Nashville bookseller. Many pages with light offsetting (darker following frontispieces) and foxing such as the paper is prone to; front free endpaper of vol. IV with pencilled ownership inscription and back fly-leaf of vol. II with pencilled annotations.
Percin de Montgaillard, Pierre Jean François de. Du droit et du pouvoir des evesques de regler les offices divins dans leurs diocéses .... [n.p., 1686?]. 8vo (20 cm, 7.9"). 229, [1 (blank)] pp. [with, as issued, the same author’s] Recueil des factums et autres pieces, qui ont servies à la deffence du calendrier du Diocése de Saint Pons. [n.p.], 1686. 8vo. [10], 269, [1 (blank)] pp.
$450.00
Scarce sole edition: Essay on canonical law regarding the rights of bishops in the Roman Catholic Church, followed by a defense of the calendar used by the diocese of Saint Pons, including letters written for and against Saint Pons’s practice. The treatises were written by the Bishop of Saint Pons (1633–1713), who incurred the ire of Pope Clement XI over his defense of Jansenist beliefs as well as that of Louis XIV over his opposition to the persecution of the Huguenots.
Extremely uncommon. Searches of OCLC, RLIN, and NUC Pre-1956 locate just three institutional holdings, only one in the U.S.
18th-century quarter sheep with speckled paper–covered sides, rubbed and abraded; front joint open and back joint starting, leather cracking and gilt lettering to spine all but lost. Front pastedown with pencilled notations and institutional bookplate, front fly-leaf and title-page rubber-stamped, front fly-leaf with inked ownership inscription dated [18]45. Pages untrimmed. Moderate foxing; some leaves with red staining along inner margin, not approaching text. Two leaves with small portion of lower margin excised; separate title-page for second work with small portion of outer margin excised and replaced some time ago with a scrap of paper bearing an early inked annotation.
Sleeping Beauty & a Bear to Boot
Perrault, Charles. Sleeping beauty of the wood; An Entertaining tale, To which is added Paddy and the Bear, a true story. Glasgow [Scotland]: Printed for the Booksellers, [18--]. 12mo. 24 pp.
$350.00
Petronius Arbiter. Satyricon quae supersunt cum integris doctorum virorum commentariis; & notis Nicolai Heinsii & Guilielmi Goesii.... Amstelaedami: Iansonio-Waesbergios, 1743. 4to (26.3 cm, 10.4"). 2 vols. I: Frontis., [37] ff., 886, [2] pp.; illus. II: [4] ff., 408 pp., [66 (index)] ff.
$600.00
Click the image above for an enlargement.

One of the most famous satires of all time, here in the expanded revision of Pieter Burman’s edition, with the much-debated corrections by Johann Jacob Reiske — with which the editor’s son, Caspar Burman, was most displeased. Brunet calls the 1743 edition “beaucoup plus complète que la précédente [of 1709], et celle qu'on recherche le plus;” Dibdin confirms that this second edition is preferred by collectors and “the
curious” over the first. The neoclassical frontispiece was engraved by J.C. Philips.
Brunet, IV, 575; Dibdin, II, 276–77; Schweiger, II, 725. 19th-century quarter sheep in imitation of morocco, with marbled paper–covered
sides, spines with gilt-stamped titles; spines, edges, and extremities rubbed, vol. I with spot of discoloration to spine. Main title-page with shadows of pencilled numerals. Pages clean.


AURORA
Petrus Riga. Aurora. Manuscript on vellum, in Latin. England (Oxford?), ca. 1210? 8vo (23.7 × 12 cm, 9.25" × 4.625"). [1] f.
$2700.00
Peter Riga’s Aurora, a verse paraphrase of the
Bible including commentary composed near the end of the 12th century, served
as a useful memory aid for students of the Scriptures. This leaf is from an
English university text of the Aurora, an early form of it most probably
written early in the 13th century. The text on this leaf is Ruth, Aurora 1.62–I
Kings, Aurora 1.84, including the narrative of the birth of Samuel.


It is written in brown ink in the small compact Gothic textura used
in the 13th century to economize space, which script predates the development
of cursive book hands later used for the same purpose. It is written in the
long narrow format commonly used for English university texts, and was most
likely produced at Oxford, where there grew up a thriving center of manuscript
production. The recto has 1 five-line red initial with pen tracery in blue
and a
five-line
blue and red “puzzle”initial with pen tracery
also in blue and red. (“Puzzle” initials are inked to appear as
if made up of colored “pieces”—like a jigsaw puzzle—and
they are distinctively, if not uniquely, a feature of English and French 13th-century
manuscripts.) The verso has 3 two-line red initials, 1 three-line, and 1 two-line
blue initials—each of these initials has pen flourishes in the contrasting
color (i.e., blue or red).
The text is written in one column of 50
lines on the recto and 51 lines on the verso. The leaf is faintly ruled in
lead on the verso only, the impression of the ruling showing on the recto,
the top line of text being above the top line of ruling; on the right edge
of the page are double rules enclosing the first letter of each line. On
the outer edge are prickings for the ruling. The left edge of the recto has
directions to the rubricator, the explicits of each section being done in
darker ink in a different hand. One line on the verso has been crossed out
with a single thin line of ink. At the bottom of the verso is the quire number
VIII and remnants of a catchword can just be seen at right on the bottom
edge.
English
manuscripts from this period are rare.
Provenance: Ex–Zion Research Foundation (later known as the Endowment for Biblical
Research); very likely to Zion from Ege.
Judith, Manuscripts
Sacred and Secular, 18, f. 9. A small hole in the lower margin.
Parchment a little soiled, especially on the hair side, as is not unusual
with English vellum. Traces of adhesive from mounting on the corners
of the verso.


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